Minor Chords
by Vanille Strawberry
Summary: When Anna was twelve years old, a well-meaning uncle who'd not been able to say anything at her mother's funeral in the way of comfort, bought her a guitar from the local pawn shop. Elsanna AU. Non-incest.
1. Home - Ryan Sheridan

Disclaimer: I do not own Frozen.

I also do not own **Don't** by Ed Sheeran.

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><p>Minor Chords<p>

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><p>1. Home, Ryan Sheridan.<p>

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><p>When Anna was twelve years old, her uncle, bought her a guitar from the local pawn shop. It hadn't been the most impressive instrument to ever grace a child's possession, but then neither was the man who had given it to her; his words of hollow comfort lost on her completely as Anna stood by the casket at her mother's funeral.<p>

The guitar was the cheapest and most basic model he could get his hands on. Still, Anna took hold of it like a drowning man to a lifesaving ring. She had held it gingerly to her chest and thanked him, voice thick with something she couldn't place. She didn't remember much else about that night. Just the comforting feel of wood against her chest and hands.

It was thanks to Paddy spotting a flyer at the butcher's front window that Anna was able to learn from an older gentleman, Mr. Cassidy. Anna began to take lessons after school and learned that Mr. Cassidy could play Eric Clapton liked he'd been born to. Under his tutelage,it became quite apparent that she had found a passion and a love. Mr. Cassidy, balding and with his own share of heartache, protected this new love fiercely. When she threatened to quit - he pushed her to keep going.

Her father, similarly, indulged her heartily. Anna's playing had become the only thing the two could talk about in the aftermath of Anna's mother's passing – and he delighted in presenting his girl to visitors, enticing her to take out the guitar and sing them something each time.

Billy Joel and U2 featured more than once in her impromptu kitchen arrangements as her tiny audience sipped at their tea. Songs like _Piano Man_ accompanied the low bubbling and whistling of the teapot. Hearty claps followed each performance. Praises were lathered; a ruffle of Anna's hair was delivered courtesy of her father, and Anna's very being warmed right to the core.

In her room, Anna rocked out to sad and wanting tunes as she dressed for school, distracted by the guitar. Frankly, she had lost count of the amount of times her father had pounded on her door for Anna to 'put down that bloody thing and get ready!' At school concerts she played more mainstream covers – Justin Timberlake, some Christina, and a little Spice Girls. It showed her ability to branch out – to grasp different genres and remix them into a distinct sound only Anna could achieve.

It was of little surprise to those who knew her, and to the immediate neighbourhood who often found the little Stone girl busking in the streets with that old nylon stringed guitar, that she was at last discovered. Approached one bright Spring afternoon by a man with a briefcase and a business card …

Thus was Anna Stone's triumphant return to Dublin City. The once tear-stained twelve year old hugging a second hand guitar to her chest in a small church could have never predicted this -

That is, the 02 arena abuzz with the chatter of thousands as they exchanged tickets for pass badges and filtered inside. A poster of tonight's act sat on display above all the entrance doors – a young woman wearing a green t-shirt and faded grey denim jeans sitting on a high stool with her back to the world, shoulders rounded slightly and head bowed. The printed word Stone shimmered in blocky print over the figure.

Inside, the opening act was in full swing. The four man band played some upbeat rock to thunderous and vigorous applause. While they entertained the masses that had begun to filter into their seats or take up residence by the barrier near the stage, others were busy buying posters and t-shirts. The lobby swarmed with people who passed reviews jumping out from placards and cut-outs of the woman's silhouette. Words like Electrifying and Masterful under easily recognized brands like Rolling Stones and Q.

When the buzzer sounded for the imminent commencement of the concert, the patrons hurried inside the main arena where the roar was almost deafening. The band finished up and took their deserved bows and rushed off stage to the clamour of applause and the screams of impatience.

The screen behind the stage flickered to life after a few tense moments of inactivity. The arena was instantly plunged in darkness. An image of a street with the sounds that could be easily recognized as the general hubbub of Dublin City sounded through the heavy duty speakers in the arena. Newspaper boys called out and shook headlines out at the public. Women tried to sell their wares from their stalls. Cars honked at the traffic's standstill. The camera moved forward – as though someone holding it had begun to walk at a leisurely pace, soaking in the atmosphere.

The audience was at a hush. Their gazes fixated on the sight of Dublin through the eyes of another. A few cheers rose when easily recognised landmarks came into focus but other than that silence prevailed.

Suddenly the person stopped. They pointed their gaze – the camera – down to the floor where snowflake stickers had been glued to the pavement. The person followed these until a pair of scuffed ballet pumps came into focus. The shoes tapped a beat that felt familiar but as mutters arose in the arena, no one could quite pinpoint exactly where they had heard it before.

The camera panned upwards, slowly revealing skinny yet frayed jeans, an old worn red zip-up hoodie and finally a freckled face with red hair in a messy ponytail. A cheer bubbled up inside the 02 and the woman on the screen offered a small crooked smile and stuffed her hands in the pockets of her hoodie.

She began to sing amidst the cacophony of a Dublin afternoon and suddenly the beat was immediately recognisable.

_Ah-la-la-la-la_

She winked at the screen before the image flickered into static and died.

Instead, the dark stage lit up with a lone spotlight shining down on a solitary figure playing a guitar. The audience roared their approval as the woman on screen suddenly appeared before them, in the flesh. Teenage girls pressed up against the barrier began to yell and reach out, desperate.

_Ah-la-la-la-la_

_I met this girl late last year_

_She said don't you worry if I disappear_

_I told her I'm not really looking for another mistake_

_I called an old friend thinking that the trouble would wait_

_But then I jump right in_

_A week later return_

_I reckon she was only looking for a lover to burn_

_But I gave her my time for two or three nights_

_Then I put it on pause until the moment was right_

_I went away for months until our paths crossed again_

_She told me I was never looking for a friend_

_Maybe you could swing by my room around 10_

_Baby bring a lemon and a bottle of gin_

_We'll be in between the sheets until the late AM_

_Baby if you wanted me then you should've just said_

_She's singing_

_Ah-la-la-la-la_

_Don't fuck with my love_

_That heart is so cold_

_All over my arm_

_I don't wanna know that babe_

_Ah-la-la-la-la_

_Don't fuck with my love_

_I told her she knows_

_Take aim and reload_

_I don't wanna know that babe_

_Ah-la-la-la-la_

When the song came to an end the noise level in the arena continued to rise to dangerous decibels. The woman, Anna, laughed into the microphone painstakingly attached to her t-shirt and she waved at the audience in the balconies and adjusted the strap of her guitar on her shoulder.

"Wow." she said, her voice almost lost amongst the still screaming fans. She glanced into the wings for a moment and giggled at someone or something before training her wide impressed eyes into the crowd again. "It's good to be home!"

At this the people in the arena went manic with excitement. Irish flags waved from above heads or were aimed and thrown at the stage. Bras were flung near Anna's feet and her laughter resonated like a ballad of its own.

"Alright, alright, everyone settle down. There you go, inside voices please." She grinned and it pulled pleasantly on her rosy cheeks. "You know what's crazy? I literally just landed in Dublin Airport like six hours ago from Lisbon. I came straight here. I didn't even go home for a cup of tea!"

Snippets of audience members laughed while others just shrieked.

"Alright, who's ready for another song? Okay, you guys pick." She absentmindedly tuned her guitar as her accompanists' quietly set up on stage. "I think I heard A Team? Yeah, A Team? Alright then." She glanced over her shoulder to the other musicians and gave them a thumb up. "You guys good with A Team?"

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><p>The concert lasted an impressive two and half hours with two encores. To the disgruntlement of some employees who checked their watches sporadically, hoping to go escape home.<p>

Anna waved one last time, drained to her bones and feeling the smile on her face ache with the effort of keeping it perched there, before she disappeared backstage and gratefully handed her guitar over to a stagehand. Various techies hovered around to unhook her microphone and wires until she was finally free to trudge into her dressing room.

She collapsed on the sofa inside running her fingers through her hair. The ache in her skull had migrated to that one annoying spot just behind her right eye and calloused fingers rubbed at the spot incessantly to ease the dull throbbing pain. Anna was so focused on her task that she failed to hear the door open.

"Great show!"

Anna jumped and whirled on the spot before relaxing back into the cushions. She grinned tiredly at the new appearance and beckoned him into the room, pointing at the assortment of food that had been laid out for her before the concert.

"Thanks. Help yourself to anything you like. I'm going to change into something that doesn't smell."

Kristoff moaned hungrily as he eyed the sandwiches and had devoured three or four by the time Anna had changed into a new t-shirt, jeans and a worn looking leather jacket. Her face was now free of the constricting makeup her agent had forced her to wear. She looked younger now, more like the Anna Kristoff had grown up with, and she sat next to him on the sofa and pat his giant kneecap as he continued to eat.

"You enjoy the show?"

He nodded, too pre-occupied to give a verbal response. Anna smirked back at him and answered a few wayward text messages from Paddy and her aunt, telling them she'd be by in the morning, before he had swallowed. "It was amazing. Thanks for hooking me up with a ticket and backstage pass. You seriously get better and better."

Anna nudged his mountainous shoulder with one of her much smaller ones, tucking her phone back in her pocket. "What are best friend's for?" she quipped. After a moment she gnawed her lip between her teeth, looking at anything but him. "What did you think of the new material?"

Kristoff paused, rubbing his greasy hands on his jeans. His face pinched a little and he shrugged without commenting. It was clear that he wanted to say something – if the atmosphere in the dressing room was anything to go by. It had thickened. It was so palpable you could cut the tension with a knife

"Look," he sighed at last when Anna began to fidget. "You can write about anything you want. What happened between you and … What I'm trying to say is that you obviously feel very passionately about what went on. And people obviously like that kind of stuff."

"I guess," Anna said quietly. She glanced at him from the corner of her eye. He was wringing his large hands together, a trait that was so – No, Anna – she gently admonished herself. Don't go there. "Come on." She rose from the couch and punched his forearm lightly. "Let's go get a drink."

They left the safety of the dressing room and wandered down to the basement car park before both clambering inside a dark tinted car. As their driver carefully rolled out onto the road teenage girls began pressing up on either side with hand-made posters and desperate expressions. Kristoff grimaced as Anna laughed and pointed to a few incredibly detailed pictures on some of the posters. It was obvious that Anna's fan base were very artistically inclined. If not a little frenzied.

The car finally shook off the last of the crowd and continued on into the city. It dropped them off in Pearse street at Anna's insistence and she and Kristoff walked contentedly through the animated Dublin nightlife. Music filtered out of pubs and clubs and the two friends playfully argued over which would be the best establishment for a catch-up drink.

Finally choosing a pub down College Street, Anna sat down in a corner booth and waited for Kristoff to join her with two pints in tow. He placed them down on the table and held out a hand, flexing his fingers slightly. When Anna merely scrunched her face up at him in clear confusion he smirked, "You're like a gazzilionaire now. You owe me for all those pints I bought you back in the day. Cough up."

Grumbling, but feeling delightedly flushed with warmth at his words, Anna felt around the pockets of her jacket before producing a fiver and pushing it into his open palm, "Free loader," she snarked.

Kristoff guffawed as he took a seat, sliding his jacket off and dumping it at the foot of his chair. "That's rich, coming from you. Miss 'I'm a poor musician, please, I'll pay you back when I become rich and famous.'"

Anna took a sip of her Bulmers, smirking into the rim of her glass. "In my defence," she said placidly, "I honestly never thought I'd ever be rich and famous."

"So you were planning on mooching off me forever?"

"Yeah, pretty much."

The two childhood friends laughed quietly under the swell of the traditional band playing an upbeat reel in the corner of the pub. Men and women were singing along rambunctiously and paying absolutely no mind to the celebrity in the corner. Anna relished the lack of attention. She and Kristoff drank as though nothing had changed – as though Anna hadn't been signed to a major record label, gone platinum in two continents and left on a major European tour. They were just Anna Stone, struggling musician, and Kristoff Arendelle.

"It's great having you home for the wedding," he said happily, foot bopping under the table to the beat of the bodhrán. "It wouldn't be the same if you weren't there."

Anna smirked wickedly at him, unwilling to show him how his words had affected her. She felt warm and wanted. "I had to be there to see you married off, Kris. What kind of best friend do you take me for?" she leaned forward and tweaked his nose. "Itty bitty Kris all grown up."

"Come off it," he grumbled around an infectious grin that Anna mirrored back. "You're such an idiot sometimes, Anna. I swear. Can't have one nice moment with you."

Anna took a hearty swig from her pint and then raised it above her head. "That's me," she agreed, "Moment ruiner." Then as Kristoff took his own slow sip, "How is my beautiful soon to be pseudo-sister-in-law?"

Kristoff's entire countenance brightened. His eyes glimmered, his smile grew and he sat up straight in his seat like some invisible puppeteer had pulled his string taught. Anna felt a painful pang of regret as she looked at him. She'd been like that once, too.

"Ciara's amazing," he breathed. "She's really looking forward to seeing you. She's sorry she couldn't make it tonight."

Anna waved the comment away. "It's okay, I got her snapchat. Nice triple chin on your future bride, by the way." She winked at him.

He leaned his fist against his cheek and chuckled a little. "I regret the day I uploaded that app on her mobile," he shared with Anna under his breath. "Just don't tell her that. She loves the effing thing."

"Your secret is safe with me," she said solemnly.

They spoke long into the night about Anna's tour and the wedding preparations. It was nice, hearing Kristoff's baritone voice against the clash of violins, tin whistles and the din of patrons at the bar talking about the latest town happenings. One pint turned to two, then three until they were well onto their fourth and sharing clumsy mishaps and laughing uproariously in their corner, cheeks red and bleary eyed.

Slurring and feeling quite catatonic, Anna didn't even have it in her to flinch when an arm slung across her shoulders. Instead she turned her head and smiled drunkenly for the woman who had invaded her personal space. "H'llo there," she purred through an embarrassing drunken hiccup. Kristoff snickered and the woman smiled lecherously.

"I thought it was you," she muttered heatedly, her lips dangerously close to Anna's own. "Anna Stone."

"S' me," Anna breathed and the other woman almost moaned from the heat of Anna's mouth. Anna pulled back a fraction, eyes roaming the other woman's body. Skin-tight leopard print dress, black heels and long dyed blonde hair. The Dublin city generic.

Under sober conditions Anna would have backed away slowly and excused both herself and Kristoff from the situation. Groupies were never a good idea for one's image. However, drunken Anna was more than happy to indulge her libido on desperate fans who wanted to bed a celebrity. And drunken Anna was a habitual occurrence these days. The amount of nights she had gone without getting absolutely smashed with drink could be counted on one hand; much to the delight of every Irish and English tabloid in existence.

"I'm a huge fan. How about we get out of here and … talk?" Anna shivered. The woman's tone was liquid sex and even Kristoff had the decency to blush scarlet, hiding his face in his large hands. There was no confusion to what she really wanted. Talking would be minimal if at all existent. Unless it was dirty talk. Anna was so down for dirty talk.

She downed the last of her pint and winked at Kristoff. He watched on helplessly as she slung an arm around the woman's shoulders and whispered something in her ear. The woman grinned, charmed, and nodded like someone wanted to hand her a winning lottery ticket. She took off for the exit, throwing a glance over her shoulder at what Kristoff guessed to be her friends howling with delight on the other side of the pub, before disappearing outside.

Anna smirked, eyes riveted on the woman's ass. She stuffed her hands in her pockets and looked content for a moment, swaying on the balls of her feet. She felt good. The alcohol was giving her a pleasurable and warm thrill and her abdomen thrummed with the thought of things to come.

She glanced at Kristoff. "I'm gonna go have sex with that stranger."

Then she stumbled out the pub without a goodbye.

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><p>It was a tangle of limbs and burning presses of Anna's mouth against the woman's (did she groan Tammy or Sammy when Anna asked her around a kiss full of tongue and teeth?) neck in the taxi. The driver didn't look too pleased but Tammy's address was far enough from the pub that he was guaranteed a good fare so he let the fact that Tammy kept moaning Anna's name in a mantra slide. He did however turn the radio up when the moans became ardent in nature and harder to ignore.<p>

Tammy's breasts were in Anna's face when the taxi rolled to a smooth stop outside a small semi-detached house. And then they were suddenly not. She missed the weight and the warmth before cool air rushed at her once preoccupied face. Her hazy mind realized they'd stopped and Tammy was throwing bills at the driver with one hand and trying to tug her out of the taxi with the other. Anna let herself be pulled along and stumbled out none too gracefully. But right into Tammy's breasts, which was good.

The taxi drove off. Anna delighted in the groan Tammy uttered when her mouth lathered attention to the tops of her breasts and her hands found purchase on a round ass. She grinned into the next kiss, marching the girl backwards towards the front door and then pressing her against it.

"Fuck!" Tammy's head hit the back of the door when Anna's thigh wedged against her centre, wet and so ready.

"Keys—" Anna growled, "Get your keys." And she spun the woman in her arms to face the door who then started to frantically search for her keys inside her bra.

_One of those girls _– Anna thought to herself – pressing up against Tammy's backside and letting her hands roam. She tweaked a nipple which earned her a squeaked moan and with the other hand she cupped Tammy's heat roughly. That earned her a guttural groan, low and primal. Tammy couldn't turn the key in the lock fast enough.

They stumbled inside the hallway as a pair. Anna righted them before they crashed to the floor and Tammy rewarded her strength by grabbing her collar and all but hauling her up the stairs. From there it was a race to see who could discard clothes the fastest. Tammy had an unfair advantage, really, was the blurry thought that entered Anna's brain. All she had to do was step out of the dress on the landing and she'd won. Anna only had her jacket and t-shirt off and was valiantly trying to pop the button of her jeans open when Tammy's underwear hit her in the face.

She blinked as they slid to the ground and, with her sight renewed, caught the tantalizing prospect of Tammy leaning back against the doorway, to what must have been her room, in all her tanned and naked glory. She was a sight for sore, drunken eyes. Anna grinned then, dark and wanton, advancing slowly on her target. She felt like a feline preying on an unsuspecting mouse.

Tammy's arms curled around her neck when Anna stepped right against her and pushed her tongue past willing lips that tasted like Corona Light. Hands fisted in her red hair and Anna felt that tell-tale pressure at the base of her spine expand and send goosebumps racing along her back and sides. Her hips undulated against Tammy's, trying to take the edge off.

"Fuck – bed," Tammy breathed harshly, pulling their lips away with a moist smack. "Bed!"

They tripped and lurched and Anna's foot stepped on what must have been a hair curler before they gratefully collapsed on Tammy's bed. The other woman helped her tug the tight jeans off and they were kicked somewhere to the floor, joined moments later by Anna's underwear and bra, before Anna was knuckle deep inside a very beautiful woman singing her name to the ceiling in pleasure filled sobs.

"Yes-yes-yes-yes," Tammy cried with every push and pull of Anna's fingers against her walls. She curled on every down stroke and let her thumb circle an engorged clit with abandon.

They were well passed the teasing stage. This girl wanted to get fucked and fucked hard. Anna wanted to get fucked and fucked hard. By this mutual interest, they were perfect for each other. So Anna drove in firmly and nipped and scraped her teeth against sensitive nipples, alternating with sharp bites to a straining neck.

"Oh god yes!" Tammy let out a shriek that her neighbours must have been able to hear. That in itself was enough to jar Anna back to some resemblance of lucidity.

Her alcohol infused brain slowed the whole scene down. Tammy was arching off the bed, feet locking at the small of Anna's back and hands fisting the top of the headboard. And yet … Anna felt no satisfaction in Tammy's reaction. Her heart didn't lurch in her chest, constrict and expand and fill with devotion at hearing her name fall from those lips. Her eyes didn't glaze over with want and need when Tammy hissed as Anna scraped a particularly sensitive spot inside of her. Tammy wasn't framing Anna's face, or cradling the back of her skull as they breathed the same air reverently in the way she adored like … like she used to.

No, Tammy did none of those things.

Regret and shame rolled in her stomach and washed in titanic waves over Anna as Tammy finally hit her peak. She held her fingers still as Tammy's hips continued to cant and buck to prolong her orgasm. When Anna pulled her hand back it was coated with the other woman's juices. The sight made a powerful guilt lodge in her chest like a weighted anchor.

Suddenly, she didn't feel so drunk any more.

She let Tammy return the favour, half-heartedly reaching a mild orgasm that did little in easing her mind of its revulsion at what she had done. Which was a novelty in itself. It wasn't often that these feelings reared up during. The mortification, the melancholy and remorse usually hit the following morning when she was safe and sound in a taxi and her conquests remained steadfastly asleep.

It didn't take long for Tammy to succumb to the pull of unconsciousness and she did so with one leg haphazardly thrown over Anna's hip and one arm slung low over her chest. The position was so familiar that Anna's eyes watered at the ceiling and she bit her lip to keep from crying. What good would it do her? Nothing. Crying would bring no reprieve from the feeling that she was in the wrong house with the wrong girl.

And although she knew that, Anna still allowed herself to sleep.

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><p>Thankfully the following morning, Tammy hadn't stirred even once as Anna extracted herself from under the other woman's possessive hold. She dressed stealthily in the hall, peeking into the bedroom to make sure the woman was still asleep. It was never easy to sneak out when the girl was awake and hell-bent on keeping the Anna Stone in the vicinity so she could brag to her friends. Or take sneaky pictures to plaster all over the internet.<p>

She checked her reflection in the bathroom mirror. Her shirt was slightly creased from a night on the floor but overall she looked somewhat presentable. Anna ran fingers through tangled strawberry hair and groaned noiselessly when it fought back against her. It would be the death of her one of these days. Thick and errant and gravity-defying – she had yet to find a conditioner that catered to these characteristics.

Deciding that this was as good as it was ever going to get, Anna made her way down the stairs. There were pictures of friends posing on a beach along the wall; candid shots of a college graduation with Tammy, with brown hair, grinning and holding a diploma. But Anna didn't stop momentarily at the bottom of the stairs for them. No, instead she stopped to view a picture of Tammy and a young woman embracing in front of this very house. They were kissing, both smiling into each other's lips, and the unknown brunette held up a single key on a chain.

Something thick and heavy lodged itself in Anna's conscience. Had she … had she just aided Tammy to cheat on her partner?

Panic welled and tears began to sting behind her eyelids. She couldn't stop gaping at the couple. They looked so happy. She couldn't reconcile the fact that she may have put that happiness in danger. Wasn't it bad enough that her own happy ending had been ruined? Had she fallen so far down in life that she had reduced herself to endangering someone else's?

She was so caught up in this train of thought that she never heard the squeak of someone stepping on a loose floorboard at the top of the stairs. It was Tammy's voice that brought her out of her alarmed disposition.

"That's Cliona," Tammy said softly, defeated.

Anna whirled and froze. Tammy was leaning against the banister wearing a soft pink bathrobe, arms crossed defensively over her chest. Her blonde hair was up in a messy haphazard bun and her shoulders were bunched under her ears. It looked like someone had stolen the very essence of life from her thin body. And Anna could see that now, in the faded morning light. Tammy was painfully thin under that robe.

Then, what Tammy had said registered at last. "Cliona?" Anna echoed in a strangled voice, "Your—"

Tammy closed her eyes and put a halting hand up. "Relax, "she said. "Cliona passed away six months ago."

"I'm sorry," Anna whispered but it was so still in the house that it carried easily to Tammy's ears. The other woman nodded absently, looking past Anna entirely.

"We bought this house two years ago," she said, the ghost of a smile on her lips. "We saved up for years. She was so proud." Tammy rubbed at an eye and Anna realized she was crying. "She got sick a while after and ..." Her bottom lip curled back in a grimace that said more than words ever could.

"It's okay," Anna said hurriedly, hands splayed out in front of her. "You don't need to tell me anything. I'm sorry for … for leaving without a word."

Tammy leaned her hip against the wooden beam and shrugged. "It's okay. I figured you would. Thanks for last night anyway. Bedding Anna Stone? Cliona's probably giving me a standing ovation from heaven."

Anna nodded as Tammy gave a hollow laugh, chin tucked against her chest before quietly slipping out the front door and closing it behind her with a soft click. Then she stood on the front step of that little house that Cliona had been so proud of and … felt numb. She pictured that brunette carrying a giggling Tammy bridal style through the doorway and suddenly lunged into some nearby bushes to empty the contents of her stomach.

The residue of alcohol and airplane peanuts burned her throat when she staggered out onto the street. Glancing around, Anna spied a bus stop. She needed to get home. She needed to get home _now_.

Decision made, Anna hopped onto the next bus and sat in the back, leaning her head against the grimy windows. At seven thirty in the morning it was packed with people on their way to college, work and school – and thankfully, they were more preoccupied with their own lives than the people sitting next to them. Still, Anna hiked her collar up close around her face and tried to not make eye-contact with anyone.

The bus ambled slowly along the streets of Dublin. No one spoke – a few people sat texting friends and family. Others stared vacantly at their laps or listened to music. It was the strangest kind of atmosphere.

Anna let her hands bunch the inside of her jacket pockets, head bowed as her mind swam with hazy memories of last night; slick hot wetness, the sting of drink down her throat, Kristoff's concerned blue eyes swimming in and out focus that mirrored - hers – to a T.

She closed her eyes, hoping to chase the visions away. But she couldn't. The picture of that little semi-detached house was burned in her retinas.

Maybe it was because Anna had her own house in a suburb that was similar to Tammy's; on a similar street with similar features and that haunting wrenching pain of the memory of a girl who had once lived there but left.

She hopped off the bus on Westmoreland Street and melted seamlessly into the crowds. American tourists moved like herds of safari animals and Anna inconspicuously joined their ranks. No one even batted an eyelid. The elderly couple at her elbow were too busy rifling through a pocket guide to Ireland to take notice of the vagabond. It was the perfect cover until she found the bus stop that would lead her home.

Although the idea of home was incredibly obtuse now, in the middle of all this hustle and bustle.

Where was home?

She knew where home had been; in a small house in the suburbs with overgrown roses bushes and gardenias. But as Anna spotted the bus stop for the house she'd grown up in, she made a decision.

Maybe it wasn't the decision her heart wanted to make … but it was close.

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><p><em> Thank you to K, my wonderful beta.<em>


	2. The End Where I Begin - The Script

Disclaimer: I don't own Frozen.

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><p>2. The End Where I Begin, The Script.<p>

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><p><strong><em>13 years ago.<em>**

The house is full of neighbors and relatives drinking.

In Ireland any and all of life's greatest and worst moments are causes for beer to be brought out and shared. And tea. The older women of the family make vast oceans of tea and hand out cups like the apostles handed out loaves and fish to the crowds in the New Testament. People cup the warmth in their palms, reassuringly, and carry on.

What feels like the entirety of Dublin have soldier marched themselves inside Anna and Paddy's small semi-detached three bedroomed house. It's bursting at the seams with uncles and aunts, grandmothers and grandfathers. Cousins stand along the fringes of conversations, lining the walls, looking uncomfortable in their Sunday best. They melt into the flowery- wall paper. Wallflowers in the truest sense.

The embodiment of the wallflowers however, are two of her mother's brothers who have spent their entire day sitting in the grass in the back garden smoking. Not talking to each other or anyone else. Their bottoms and shins are muddy and stained green. They just keep puffing away silently, willing tonight to be a nightmare.

Oh how feverishly Anna wishes she could will this into a nightmare – one she will wake up from, then race into her parent's bedroom, and curl up beside her living breathing mother. Curl up under her arm like a sleepy pup.

It's not a nightmare.

Although it is suffocating like one. Ties have been loosened around necks and jackets shed on the backs of chairs as night begins to creep. The chatter rises into the sky. Chatter that echoes phrases like "Much too soon", "So very young", "Always the good ones."

Muted stars dot the twilight outside.

Anna's breath fogs in the air as she sits on the front step and traces constellations she never learned. She can hear the muffled sounds of music playing inside – her mother's favourite album; A Matter of Trust by Billy Joel. She bites her tongue, hard.

It doesn't feel real. Her head feels lead heavy as she holds it in her hands and tries to make sense of everything. Because a week ago her mother was still alive and badgering her about getting her science project finished and handed in. And a week ago her father could still look her in the eye.

It boggles her, absolutely, that a life can be snuffed out so easily. That one single organ can dictate the decision between life and death so cruelly.

It's funny, Anna thinks, rubbing at her red and stinging eyes.

She'd admired Brenda's heart.

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><p>Elsa finds her on the step an hour later, shivering and wiping her runny nose on the edge of her hand. She starts a little when a jacket drapes across her shoulders. The pattern inside is floral – pink. The sleeves are too long for her short and freckled arms.<p>

"You'll get cold."

Anna glances up briefly, eyes dark. Elsa looks haloed from the porch light – an angel.

Her blonde hair tumbles over her back and shoulders in soft golden waves, in stark contrast to her dress. Black and black and more black. All Anna can see is the white porcelain of her shoulders, arms and face. The rest of her body bleeds into the dark of the world, stars their only company.

Elsa's eyes are red-rimmed too and when her fingers lay softly against Anna's hair, Anna arches into the touch desperately.

"I've felt cold all day," Anna says, sliding her eyes closed in mortification when her voice breaks.

Elsa sits at her side in an incomprehensibly graceful move. Like a swan dive. She gathers Anna in her arms and begins to shush her gently when the other girl curls into Elsa's body and begins to cry. It's a dam breaking. A mighty wave crashing against a lighthouse.

Elsa Arendelle is her best friend in the entire world.

Her lighthouse.

Right now, she's the only thing keeping Anna from running away.

Elsa kisses her hair and runs cool hands along her now covered arms. Her murmurings are soft Gaelic tones, lullabies and poems that Anna soaks up like a sponge. It's a habit Elsa has always had, since her mother tuned the car radio to the Irish station and Elsa's eyes lit up. It's a habit that Anna clings to with both hands.

I wish I was on yonder hill  
>Tis there Id sit and cry my fill<br>Till every tear would turn a mill  
>Is go dte tu mo mhuirnin slan.<p>

Siuil, siuil, siuil a ruin  
>Siuil go sochair agus siuil go ciuin<br>Siuil go doras agus ealaigh liom  
>Is go dte tu mo mhuirnin slan<p>

* * *

><p>They take a walk, Elsa's arm around one of her own and the sound of Elsa's heels clicking on the pavement. Anna is grateful for the pressure and the sound. It anchors her here, to space and time. It also makes Elsa taller. Anna feels safe.<p>

When they turn the corner down the road and cross the deserted junction towards their school, Elsa finally talks.

"I saw the guitar your uncle … ?"

"Ernie," Anna supplies monotonously.

"Ernie." Elsa's eyes bore into the side of her face. Anna wants to hike the collar of Elsa's jacket up. "Yeah, the guitar he got you."

Anna makes a non-committal sound from the back of her stinging throat. Meanwhile, they pass the gates of the school where the principal broke the news to her in his office, knelt in front of her seat. The bars make long shadows on the pavement and the trees rustle in the wind.

She doesn't really want to think about Uncle Ernie's complete lack of knowledge on social convention. No one in their right mind gives a teenager a guitar at their mother's funeral. Not unless they're smoking some crazy shit.

Anna pauses in her musings, thoughtful.

Now that she thinks about it … Uncle Ernie is probably shooting up every other weekend. He's had a half crazed look in his eye ever since she's known him. Today he's on his best behavior. Combed his hair, pressed his suit, ironed his shirt. He says nothing as he meanders through the rooms with a hip flask, taking swigs as he inspects family photographs on the walls.

"You should learn to play."

Anna's head whips to face Elsa. They stop next to a 'slow children' signpost. A taxi drives passed and his headlights heightens the timid look on Elsa's face and the disgruntled annoyance on Anna's.

"Learn to play?" she repeats slowly. "Why the fuck would I do that?"

She's so fed up of tonight she doesn't even have it in her to feel guilty that she's sworn in front of Elsa. Which she never does. Elsa is a proper lady and Anna usually respects her too much to be so crass.

The other girl bites her bottom lip and looks down, curbed.

Anna thinks Elsa is going to spew some bullshit about how her mother would have liked her to. About how it could be a good outlet for her grief and teenage angst. For these, Anna has a simple retort: Fuck off.

She's not looking to honor her mother's memory in song or pick up her broken pieces in melodies.

But Elsa doesn't say any of this. She only looks off into the distance – back towards Anna's house – and says quietly, quiet as a mouse, "I don't know … you could be good at it."

* * *

><p>When they get back Anna stops on the front porch and untangles from Elsa.<p>

Which is almost unthinkable. There's nothing Anna wishes for more in the dead of night than to be always be tangled with Elsa. But her presence is alarmingly suffocating right now and her touch burns through Anna's flesh. All she can think, while Elsa looks at her with those cornflower eyes, is that the last thing Anna spoke to her mother about was how her heart raced whenever she caught a glimpse of blonde hair.

"You go back inside. I'm going to stay out here for a while."

Elsa's lips part like she wants to say something but nothing comes out. So she nods and smiles, tells Anna she'll keep a cup of tea warm for her.

Anna's frozen heart thaws just the slightest bit at that and she watches Elsa disappear inside the house.

Anna breathes, sharp. The night is crisp and clean – almost painfully so. So she turns and runs.

It's the first time she spends the night on a park bench.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Flashback 1. Chapter two to follow tomorrow evening. The Irish song mentioned is a lullaby called Suil A Ruin. I've sung it to a lot of crying children in the past. It's heartbreaking but absolutely gorgeous and can be found on Youtube.**

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Curious-browser127: My lips are sealed, we'll just have to see how the story develops! The inspiration comes from a mix of experience and imagination. I won't be sharing anything at all (unlike what I did with HIMYM-Frozen). I'm just going to enjoy watching people speculate. Thank you for your support.

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	3. The Preacher - Big September

Disclaimer: I don't own Frozen.

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><p>3. The Preacher, Big September.<p>

* * *

><p>The Stone's of Dublin were a hearty hard working folk.<p>

Anyone who knew them could attest to that. The kind of folk who, generation after generation, added to the landscape of the land – building bridges, boats, houses and landmarks. They toiled and worked their backs and hands to the bone. Their flesh burnt in the sun, their faces sunk and their pride shone through the cracks of laugh lines and wrinkles.

Education had never fared very high on a Stone's list of priorities in the same way that finding work had. Boys and girls alike were expected to pull their weight and contribute to the maintenance of the family unit.

Anna's own father had been enticed out of school at the young age of fourteen, as was habitual of elder sons. With basic mathematical skills and the ability to read and write Paddy Stone had leapt from job to job with no real rhyme or reason as his father and grandfather had before him. The legacy was one that had continued up until Anna. And although the jobs hadn't satisfied Paddy's soul in any capacity, it had provided bread for the table and kept a roof over his many siblings' heads. So Paddy endured the gritty work that came with being a labourer with very limited options.

That is, until he met Brenda O'Toole.

Brenda O'Toole was born the middle-class daughter of a bookstore owner. Her father had gone against the grain and, if a little hesitantly, paid for his daughter to continue her education in Trinity College where she took to philosophy and literature like a duck to water. A love fostered within the dusty rows of bookshelves and inside tomes with yellowed and browned pages. Her fondest memories of her father in fact were warm and dozing afternoons spent on his lap reading Dickens or Hopkins, tracing the letters with her fingers as he read aloud.

With concrete qualifications under her belt Brenda became a teacher and taught a small philosophy class of mostly well to do upper class wives who wanted to get out of the house and away from their husbands for two nights a week. The work hadn't satisfied Brenda's soul in any capacity, but it had provided bread for her table and a roof over her head. So Brenda endured the housewives and dreamt of younger faces and her own classroom.

Meanwhile, sick of being on the lowest ring of the pay scale, a fresh faced twenty one year old Paddy decided to take a once-a-week maths class at the local night school. Which led to Paddy clumping his way into Brenda's classroom one evening, awkward in his ill-fitting suit, and with a shiny new metallic pencil case and notebook his mother had bought him in preparation for his first lesson in well over seven years.

At the first meeting of eyes between pupil and teacher, as Paddy stood in that open doorway with a fist poised to knock and a question at his lips of whether this was the Algebra class he'd been dreading all week … he was instantly smitten.

He took a seat front and centre and neither of them ever looked back.

Paddy's mathematics, to this day, remain abysmal at best. His knowledge of philosophy however was to match that of any educated scholar. And although he had never found true happiness and meaning in his work as a labourer he most certainly had through Brenda. They were wed during a snowfall. And, as was expected for the time, tried for a family.

Four years. Four years of wishing, of prayers, of candles lighting in St. Vincent's church by frumpy grandmothers and nosey aunts and neighbours. Four years of dried tears and fights brought upon by frustrations and hopelessness. Four years before Paddy asked a distraught Brenda to come with him to the doctor – just to make sure everything is alright, love – routine, he'd said.

Brenda was barren. It broke both of their hearts. Paddy knelt on the linoleum floor in the doctor's office and held his young bride's hands while her shoulders shook and tears ran down both of their faces.

They'd given up all hope. That is, until a swathed bundle in a cream blanket wailing at the top of her lungs came into their life one crisp Wednesday morning.

Not much was known about Anna's origins. Left at the doors of St. Angela's Convent in an old pram and cream blanket with a letter that simply read; "Her name is Anna. Born today. I love her enough to let her go" and found by a Sr. Ursula McCarthy who'd gone out that morning to collect the bottles of milk.

Attempts had been made to find Anna's family before she was moved to a mother and baby home, and later still, to Brenda's arms. Or so Paddy had told her gently when she'd asked, wondering why it was that other children had stories of being in their mummies tummies and she didn't.

Anna's birth mother had never been found – nothing was known of her. Not her name, nor her age, nor even if she lived in the parish. Only that she loved Anna … wished for her to be given a better chance. And Anna couldn't find it in her to hate the stranger who had given her up. She wondered often if the faceless woman in her mind had been a young girl, alone and frightened, cast out by her family? Or a woman caught in a bad situation – unable to care for herself, let alone a baby. Maybe that stranger (with her red hair perhaps? Blue eyes, freckles and dimples that neither Brenda nor Paddy possessed) had done right by her, her first and last act as a mother.

Anna had gotten her best chance with Paddy and Brenda. They had opened their home and their hearts to a small crinkly baby when no one else would. And that small crinkly baby had grown up to wear their name like a badge of honour.

Stone's were a hearty and hard working folk.

Anna was no exception, no matter whose blood coursed in her veins.

* * *

><p>Anna was stood on the front step of her childhood home. She smiled as she took in all the familiar smells and sounds. The door was still painted a Barney the Dinosaur purple. The letterbox still had droplets of the colour on its metallic mouth all these years later from Anna's uncoordinated toddler hands eager to help Paddy as he small lawn was cut and the windows were clear and reflecting the dimmed October sunshine into Anna's eyes.<p>

Taking a deep breath, Anna rasped her knuckles against the wood and waited. It wasn't long before it was thrown open and a small and plump woman wearing a white apron filled the doorway. The woman's eyes rounded before she threw her arms around Anna's slight frame and crushed her fiercely to her chest.

"Oh Anna," the woman hiccupped happily, tightening her hold, "You're finally home!"

Anna allowed the affection feeling unbidden tears burn behind her eye sockets. Aunt Gerda was her father's youngest sister and her closest confidant. She'd moved in with Anna and Paddy after her grandfather had passed away, having spent most of her adult life caring for him. He'd suffered from every illness imaginable. Although Anna felt loneliness had more to do with it than anything else. He'd crumbled when his wife had passed.

Anna had sympathised with him. When her mother died she'd been consumed by loneliness and pain, secluding herself from the rest of the family – sleeping rough even. Paddy hadn't known how to handle it. He'd kept largely to himself, too. For a year before Gerda joined their family, Anna and her father had barely spoken to each other. If they did it was in raised voices and tears - Anna coming home to pack bags and take showers before leaving for weeks at a time.

Gerda had pulled them out of that. Out of the abysmal black hole their lives had become. Anna was inconceivably grateful.

"Hi, Aunt G." She pulled out of the hold gently and let the matron hold her at arm's length, appraising her with a critical eye. Anna tried not to fidget under her scrutiny.

"You've lost weight," she said. She sounded accusing.

Anna shrugged and let herself be pulled into the house and through to the kitchen where Paddy was sitting at the kitchen table reading an electric bill. He looked up when the door opened and jumped to his feet at the sight of the shock of red hair that he'd once nestled in the crook of his arm.

"Anna!"

And then Anna's arms were full. She hugged her father fiercely. Conversations on the phone didn't hold a candle to having him close. He still smelled like tobacco and turf from the open fireplace in his Local. She'd always associated that smell with her father. Any whiff of cigarette smoke propelled her mind home.

His arms crushed her but she didn't mind. He was much shorter than she was. His ruffled grey hair tickled her cheeks as she hugged him. When he pulled back she could see that he'd put on weight – contrary to what Gerda had accused her of.

"Has Aunt G been fattening you up then?" she chuckled, taking a step back to observe the new girth to his abdomen. His belt strained against the protrusion but Paddy simply pat his stomach proudly and grinned at her.

"Good food and good drink are all that's needed in this life, Clover." He gestured for her to sit in his chair before bustling towards the kettle and setting out three mugs.

Anna did as directed. Her eyes surveyed the room like a starving man to a feast. Nothing had changed. If anything, it just looked a lot cleaner without her clothes and mess strewn about. Gerda had certainly seized the opportunity to spring clean while their disorganized child had flown the coop.

The frames of mounted family portraits and candid shots of Anna in various states of infancy and youth gleamed in the soft morning light. Anna's mother seemed to wink at her from a birthday photograph where a three year old Anna was attempting to squish her pudgy hands into the chocolate cake as Brenda held her securely.

Anna smiled and sent her a mother a little thought of love.

A mug of tea and plate of Jaffa cakes was set on the table when Gerda emerged from the bathroom and Paddy had finished his tinkering in the kitchen. The three Stone's sat and talked about Anna's time away. What had she done? Who had she met? Had she been eating at all while she'd been away?

"And those girls," Gerda said with a contrite look on her face. She looked ill at the thought. "Honestly, Anna. We didn't raise you like that."

"You have to respect women," Paddy continued with a pointed finger at Anna's chest. "And all of that drinking! Honestly!"

Anna's eyes dropped to the tablecloth. This was a rehashed point if there had ever been one. Paddy and Gerda were an open-minded sort. They'd taken her coming out with incredible ease citing that Anna's happiness was all they wanted. If Anna was happy with a woman then they would fully support her. However Paddy, ever the gentleman, had taken her trail of broken hearts poorly. He hadn't wanted Anna to disregard women as playthings – which was largely what she was treating them like, she knew. Simply things to occupy her mind and body. They knew, though. They knew she couldn't afford to open up again -

"We know that it was hard for you when -"

Anna almost dropped her tea on her lap in her haste to stop her father mid-sentence. "_No_. I know, okay? The tabloids just make a lot of this up. Yes I went on some dates, but that's really it. The exaggerations about the drinking too. The media will do anything to tarnish you once you're in any way popular."

Paddy seemed mollified by this explanation. Which of course he would be. Anna knew no father wanted to think of their daughter sleeping with half the population of the island or drinking herself into a coma. Gerda however eyed her warily. Anna tried to avoid her gaze and instead changed the subject quickly on the recent happenings in the neighbourhood.

It was quiet place. The houses were red bricked, damp and semi-detached. When Anna was younger the whole place had been alive with children playing on the street with balls and skipping ropes. Now, the children had grown and moved on. All that was left were their aging parents stuck in this vacuum. The land that time forgot.

Which wasn't so bad, Paddy had told her once over the phone while Anna lounged, stoned, in her Parisian hotel room.

"Community, Anna. Family. That's what we are. That's what's important in life. All us old folk pull together."

"You're all done up today," she said suddenly. Which was true. Paddy was dressed in his best suit and tie. A quick glance Gerda's way revealed that the woman had divested herself of her apron which had hidden a lovely green dress from Anna's view.

"It's Sunday, Anna," Gerda explained as she cleared the table. "We're going to ten o'clock mass. And you're coming with us. No excuses."

Anna paled acutely.

* * *

><p>She was ushered out the door, in her crinkled shirt and jacket no less, and soldier marched out of the house. Gerda was quick to let her know that they didn't have time for Anna to rifle through her wardrobe to wear something more appropriate. And anyway, they'd just fall off her with the weight she'd lost.<p>

So Anna looped her arm around her father's and let Gerda cling to her unaccompanied forearm as they made the short trip to St. Vincent's church. Gerda and Paddy rattled off all the church gossip they'd retained since Anna's last visit. Old Fr. O'Farell, the priest, was still tending to his parish flock as he had since Anna had been al little girl. He had a few new helping hands in the form of Fr. Mahoney and Fr. Caroll. Also, Mrs. Howard had recently lost her husband – "So whatever you do don't sit next to her because she'll tell you things about his leg ulcer that will make your stomach turn."

"Aunt G!" Anna laughed despite herself, "That's terrible."

"But true," Paddy said as he held the church door open for them.

Anna and Gerda slipped inside and filtered into a pew as the small church filled with families. There was a low soothing buzz of chatter that rose up to the painted ceiling depicting several biblical scenes. Anna had stared at them quite a bit during her adolescence. She'd glared at the artist's interpretation of God and damned him for taking her mother away – for taking … for taking …

Anna closed her eyes tightly and gritted her teeth. She couldn't even say her name. Christ what was wrong with her?

Mass started with the entirety of the congregation angled slightly in their seats to stare at her. Anna tried to ignore them and concentrate on what Fr. O'Farell was saying but even that was proving a challenge. He was as droning and monotone as ever – she could see the altar boys trying very hard not to nod off.

A few snippets of Fr. O'Farell's sermon did filter through Anna's sluggish brain.

"Our lives are short. Our involvements are but the ripple in God's ocean. But together, yes together, we can create mighty waves. If we reach out to each other we can begin the tide of change."

In Anna's experience togetherness hadn't really worked out all that well for her. People never stayed. Fr. O'Farell lived in a world where Christians pulled each other up and stayed rooted like mighty oaks, weathering every storm together. He'd seen it in church bake sales and collections. He'd seen it in old ladies laying out the tea after children's bible readings on a Sunday.

Fr. O'Farell had never experienced being pulled from class by the principal to be told his mother had passed during the morning and that – _we offer our most sincere condolences, Anna_. He'd never experienced coming home to an empty house with half the wardrobe missing and his ring left on the bedside table. He'd never experienced a text message that pulled the world underneath his feet and sucked what was left of his ability to love and to lose.

People didn't stay and Fr. O'Farell could stuff it.

After, as the masses trickled out and several children asked Anna to sign the back of their Mass programmes, Gerda tugged Anna bodily towards the priest's vestibule where Fr. O'Farell stood – changed out of his robes now – speaking to a tearful Mrs. Howard. It was habitual that people who had travelled out of the parish for long periods of time return to receive a blessing and quick amicable word with the priest.

Mrs. Howard thanked him for his kind words and departed quickly at the sight of Anna and her family. Paddy watched her go sympathetically, an old shared ache in his eyes.

"Well I'll be!" Fr. O'Farell exclaimed and shook Anna's hand heartily, "Our little Choir girl returned to us at last!"

Anna's cheeks pinked acutely and her ears made the acquaintance of her shoulders. Gerda, hand between her shoulder blades, gave her a small encouraging pat. It seemed to say,_ "Be nice, Anna."_

"Thank you, Father."

The priest's eyes moved to her father and the two men shared a smile and a handshake of their own. "Mr. Stone, wonderful to see you. My, you must be proud of your Anna."

Paddy's mouth twitched and he sent Anna a soft look full of paternal pride. "Aye, that I am."

"I hear you on the radio sometimes," Fr. O'Farell said, "I've told the other parish priest's "That was once my choir girl!"."

Anna nodded awkwardly, unused to his kindness. Fr. O'Farell had never liked her. She'd been too boisterous, too loud – too everything. Fr. O'Farell was an old-fashioned sort of priest. He enjoyed the sombre and pious approach to religion. Paying for your sins, crying out the dangers of hell and limbo, accusing his congregation of slipping towards the devil. Old coot.

His reaction to Anna _post_ singing career wasn't anything new though. Many who hadn't looked at Anna twice as a teenager were suddenly overzealous in their appreciation of her. Their skewered remembrances of the past were always amusing to witness, too.

"I never took you for the choir type but praise the lord that Miss Arendelle dragged you to auditions," he continued, smiling widely at them.

Anna stiffened acutely at the name. She felt something in her stomach sink in a way that made her ill.

Gerda, noticing Anna's reaction, bid Fr. O'Farell a hurried farewell once he'd given Anna a blessing and led Anna out of the vestibule with Paddy hot at their heels. Anna was shaking and couldn't feel her legs as her aunt walked her outside into a grey afternoon. She took greedy gulps of fresh air and tried to stop the images running through her head by laying a clammy and trembling hand to her forehead.

Thankfully, she was saved from further contemplation of Fr. O'Farell's words when some parishioners' came forward with their church pamphlets for an autograph. She did so automatically while Gerda and Paddy talked in hushed urgent tones and pulled her away and home when the last admirer had departed.

The walk was done in silence. Gerda and Paddy folded together a half step in front of Anna, hands in her jacket and head bowed in contemplation. Sensing the dark turn her thoughts had taken Gerda blurted, "You should sing something for Mass next Sunday!"

Paddy hummed an encouraging affirmative.

"I'll think about it," Anna grunted.

Gerda fell silent at the clear dismissal. She wilted like a flower caught from sunlight and said very little else all the way home. Anna slipped passed the brother and sister on the porch and entered, taking the stairs two at a time. Bound for her room, she all but kicked the door open and crumpled to the old single bed without a look at her surroundings and fell instantly asleep.

She woke to someone's hand at her shoulder several hours later, shoving her repeatedly. She groaned and tried to bat her assailant away.

"Oi," the gruff voice said next to her ear, "Will you wake up, you big lump."

"Fuck off," she muttered breathy, still groggy with sleep.

"I swear to Christ, Anna. I will get a hose."

Anna sat up blearily at the threat and shifted so that her back was pressed against the wall. It was Kritoff that was sitting on the edge of her bed. He was dressed in a clean dark suit with his hair coiffed. It was obvious he'd just come by after work. Anna glanced to the window quickly and noticed that it was dark outside.

She'd slept all day?

"Jesus," she moaned, holding a fist to her temple. "How long was I asleep for?"

Kristoff eyed her cagily. "Your dad said you've been upstairs since this morning. It's like 7 in the evening."

The events of that morning came by in piercing flashes. It was like having a bright light shone into your eyes after a lifetime of darkness and Anna physically flinched from it. If Kristoff noticed, he was tactful enough not to mention it.

"I came by to see if you wanted to go out with Ciara and I. We could talk about wedding stuff, you know?" His eyes travelled from her enormous bed hair to her crumpled t-shirt. "We could reschedule," he added quickly.

Anna rubbed the sleep from her eyes and shook her head, voice rough, "No, no. It's fine. I'll take a quick shower and change and we can head out."

Kristoff frowned uncertainly but said, "Okay, good. I wanted you two to hang out at least one before the big day. I know how you get, Anna. You'll slip off the radar completely if I don't wrangle you in early."

"I'm not a fucking sheep, Kris," she groused as she sat with her face in her hands. She tried to will herself to move from the bed but found that the motivation wouldn't materialize.

"No I know that."

When she glanced upwards after a few tense moments of silence, it was to see Kristoff gazing at his phone, biting his bottom lip softly. She dropped her hands to her jean clad kneecaps and craned her neck to see what he was looking at.

It was his screensaver. A picture of Ciara (long brown hair, brown eyes and that serene smile on her face that had stopped Kristoff dead in his tracks on the first day of college) and of … _her_. Both girls were dressed in heavy duty parkas, hair whipping about in the wind as they walked along the shore of a beach. Anna could see the sea over Ciara's shoulder.

A lump lodged itself in her throat that made it hard to breathe let alone swallow the bile that was rising at the sight. _She_ still looked perfect. An angel in a red windbreaker.

Kristoff remembered himself at last and yanked the phone away, muttering, "Shit, sorry, sorry. I forgot. We … we went out with the kites and … sorry, I just look at her picture sometimes when I'm nervous …" he trailed off, pocketing the device and looking as though someone had told him his dog had died.

"I'm sorry. I just need my best friend to come to dinner with my fiancée and me because I miss you. We all do, Anna."

Anna let out a long heavy breath. "It's okay, Kris. No harm no foul."

Only that wasn't true. It felt like someone had thrown her into a frozen lake.

She was suddenly in the mood to get shitfaced.

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><p><strong>AN: Fun fact, every chapter title is the name of a song and the Irish artist/band who plays it.**

**Review Responses:**

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	4. High Hopes - Kodaline

Disclaimer: I don't own Frozen.

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><p>4. High Hopes, Kodaline<p>

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><p>Elsa pulls on her hand firmly. Anna trips behind her feeling a little foolish as passing people glance their way, curious. Elsa's parents are still by the car trying to straighten Kristoff's tie and pay to the two vagabonds no heed.<p>

The church bells are tolling and the murmur of the congregation inside the church sounds like the buzz of summer crickets Anna once heard on a holiday to Spain. Elsa keeps tugging at her hand – up the aisle and towards Fr. O'Farell and a mismatched huddle of children. The majority are yawning into sheet music and mumbling to each other.

"Fr. O'Farell!" Elsa crows dropping Anna's hand when they reach the pulpit and Fr. O'Farell's stern countenance turns to regard them suspiciously. "I brought her!"

Fr. O'Farell's thick eyebrows knit as he studies Anna – gangly ten year old limbs stuffed into a flower patterned frock – and the way she's holding herself. Shoulders curved in defensively, toes pointing inwards, arms locked uneasily behind her back. When her eyes meet his her nose, which is splattered with freckles, scrunches in embarrassment.

He looks to Elsa. Miss Arendelle is the epitome of poise in her sunflower dress and white cardigan. She is lean and almost a head taller than her peers. When her eyes meet his her smile widens expectantly. She has promised him a voice like no other for his struggling little choir.

"Hmm," he says, throwing a long sidelong glance to Miss Anna Stone, Patrick Stone's daughter. She doesn't look like much. He supposes finally that she'll have to do.

"Alto or soprano?"

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><p>"Fucking idiot," Anna grouses eight years later as she lights her cigarette on the sidewalk outside the church and takes a drag.<p>

Merida accepts the lighter and lights her own, nodding. They lean together against a lamppost and smoke quietly. Merida's lips are frigid blue from the weather and Anna's unoccupied and freezing hand migrates into a pocket of her coat for warmth.

"Why do we even keep singing for this fucking thing?" Merida muses aloud.

Anna shrugs, inhaling a lungful. When she blows out the smoke through her nostrils like an irritated dragon Merida smirks through a chuckle. "Because your parents would kill you if you quit?"

"True." Merida flicks some ash from the butt of her cigarette and inclines her head to Anna, eyes mischievous. "And you're entirely too whipped by Elsa to even try."

Anna's cheeks flush and she throws the curly haired woman a murderous look. Merida returns the look squarely, silently demanding that Anna try to deny what everyone can tell is true. If it weren't for Elsa's ecstatic support of Anna's involvement in their local church choir the girl would have hightailed it out of there years ago. Alas, with Elsa's continued attendance to mass every Sunday Anna has been veritably chained to Fr. O'Farell's circus of tone-deaf wailers.

"Whatever," Anna grouses grumpily.

They walk home together when they're finished, crushing the cigarettes under their boots. Backpacks thrown over their shoulders the two red haired girls talk about Fr. O'Farell's latest arrangement with sneers and un-lady like curls to their lips. The conversation ebbs and flows gently like a stream – changing seamlessly into college talk.

Merida is in her first year of History and Mythology. She's taken up archery and winks Anna's way when the other girl gawks.

Anna is in her first year of Geology and struggling. She's taken up smoking and drinking as she watches everyone around her succeed.

"It can't be that bad," Merida tells her as they turn a corner. She kicks a stone and it skips a few paces ahead of them.

"Oh but it can," Anna assures her, "I'm the dumbest person there. The only upside to this entire college experience is being able to have lunch with Elsa."

Merida 'aww's' cutely and dodges Anna's punch.

* * *

><p>Anna is twenty-three. She's sitting in the front pew of St. Vincent's church with her arm around Elsa's shoulders listening to Fr. O'Farell talk about God and she thinks she gets it. She really thinks she gets it now.<p>

Sunlight streams in from the stained-glass windows and Elsa's hair halos like an angel.

She kisses Elsa's cheek and feels the other girl's smile.

She's does. She gets it.

* * *

><p>St. Vincent's church is cavernous and dark as she stands near the baptism font and stares at the crucifix over the alter – Her hands are trembling and the ache in her chest is so raw and deep that it hurt to breathe around it.<p>

Anna is twenty-four, almost twenty five. She's started smoking and drinking tonight, after almost four years of sobriety.

She looks upon the face of God's fallen son and bites her bottom lip so hard it draws a single drop of blood.

She doesn't understand it. She just doesn't get it.

* * *

><p>AN: **Flashback 2. Chapter 5 to follow tomorrow evening. **

**Review Responses:**

iwantaparrot1: I'm very glad!

Tigger: We'll have to wait and see ... Thank you, I'm rather fond of Dublin.

Phoebex13: Oh don't be missing sleep over this story! Ah yes, the Elsanna plot thickens. I'm very glad you were able to find some connection to Anna's story with your own. I think that just highlights how important characters are as a representation to society and individuals. Expect Elsa to make a very big appearance at around chapter 8.

ThatPatheticFanficReader: Thank you!

ElsaMaureenElphaba: I feel you, I'm in the middle of college myself. Thank you!

kenfromnhus: I'm very glad.

Lame guest: Super, I was hoping some fellow Irish fans would be pleased. They say write what you know and I live here so ... might as well base my stories here too.

Guest: Ooh, you noticed that, huh? Good eye. Thank you!

Curious-browser127: Thank you, although I don't know what that says about my mental health (lol). Thank you very much.

Mattnextus: Thank you!

Kyoko-nyaa: We'll have to wait and see. It's a very good song and would in fact suit this fic, but unfortunately I've had the song-list planned since July. Although I'll definitely add it to the inspiration mix.

Lauren H 91: When we get to the good (at some far off point in time!) it'll be very much worth it. Thank you!


	5. Left Alone - Hudson Taylor

Disclaimer: I don't own Frozen.

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><p>5. Left Alone, Hudson Taylor<p>

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><p>The papers were slid across the desk in one definitive and certain gesture. It was like a chess manoeuvre – a checkmate performed by the Queen of the board.<p>

X marked the spot intended for Anna's signature. She levelled her pen across the line and caught a glimpse of the label representative watching her, his mouth hidden behind a hand as he declined yet another cup of tea from Gerda.

The new deal spanned two years and one album. It was all Anna felt she was ready to give. At first, the label had wanted her on board for a five year and two album contract. They'd pushed quite viciously too. It had felt like too much too soon.

Anna wasn't even sure if she wanted to do this for much longer.

She signed her name in awkward and blocky letters. It looked like a child had taken hold of her pen in his awkward fingers. She grimaced down at her name before looking at the representative, Mr. Browne from Liverpool, awaiting his judgement.

"Great," he said, shifting his weight forward to retrieve the signed papers. "And like it stipulates in the contract you'll avail of the next two months off and will partition your time between our Dublin and Galway studios."

"Yes."

They'd wanted her to start her album in London but she'd put her foot down on that. Snowflake had been written and recorded in Dublin, ever before the label had come knocking. The small studio had served Anna well.

That and the thought of leaving Ireland so soon after having returned churned her stomach. She wanted to be around to see her father and aunt. She wanted to be around to see Kristoff get married and start his life with his new wife.

"I think it goes without question that you stay out of trouble. I don't want to see any tabloids proudly presenting another one of your indiscretions. Also, we'll have your luggage sent over this afternoon from the hotel room we paid for that you didn't use." He shuffled the papers together and slid them into the black briefcase on his knees. "Any questions?"

Anna shook her head, curbed by his totalitarian tone.

He smiled at her tightly and handed over a flat white business card. The font was bright and the letters blood red. His name sat snugly below the label's along with his contact number.

"Give me a call if anything pops up."

She took hold of it between her fingers and nodded absently. "Thank you, Mr. Browne."

"Are you sure you won't have that cup of tea?" Gerda hollered from the kitchen. Anna could hear the sound of the kettle whistling.

Mr. Browne rose to his feet and declined once again. "No thank you, Ms. Connolly. I must be on my way."

Anna walked him to the front door and shook his hand goodbye, watching the gentleman enter his rented car (an ostentatious porche) before he drove off down the street, revving the engine for extra effect. An old woman at the bus stop almost spilled all her bags at the sudden noise. Anna shook her head and rolled her eyes exasperatedly.

When she entered the living room again Gerda had sat herself down in Mr. Browne's discarded armchair with her own cup of tea.

"Didn't eat any of my biscuits," she sniffed at Anna. "Strange man."

Anna grinned secretly as she cleared the table and dumped the dishes in the sink, filling it slowly with hot water. She was in the motion of adding some soap when Gerda announced, "What is it with them trying to get you to England?"

"Oh, you know," she said vaguely, "They love having their singers under their thumb. Easier to keep an eye on me that way."

Gerda made a noise like she understood, though Anna very much doubted that. "Well, _I_ for one am glad you're sticking around, dear."

Anna hummed a pleased note, thinking back on Kristoff's words last night.

Leaning on both Kristoff and Ciara's shoulders as they helped the singer out of the taxi and up the stairs of her own home, the man had grumbled into her ear that he was glad she was back. "Don't know why," he'd continued as her head lolled against his chest in her drunken stupor, "You're a fucking mess. And it's always somehow my job to get you home."

She cringed. The memory was murky but present. Ciara had changed her into some pyjamas and the two had laid her into bed in a semi recumbent position – lest Anna choke on her own vomit during the night. It was all Ciara's fault really. She should have known better than to challenge Anna to a shot-off. Ciara managed three before calling it a night. Anna lost count. And then she made the acquaintance of the floor.

The result had been the largest hangover this century. Her aunt hadn't helped matters any by making tea at the inhumane hour of six in the morning. Honestly, they had the loudest bloody kettle in the country. The fact that the walls were paper thin hadn't helped either. In between holding a clenched fist to her pounding head and cursing, Anna had concocted a fantasy of a completely soundproofed home where a permanent ban on kettles was upheld.

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><p>A few hours later armed with a list and the stern warning that, should she forget anything she could think twice about returning, Anna departed the house and embarked on the ten minute walk to the local Tesco. She revelled in the fresh winter air biting at her cheeks and pinking her face under her scarf and hood. She loved the cold – it had never bothered her before.<p>

Tesco was devoid of life at noon on a Monday. It meant Anna could shop to her heart's content without the threat of detection. She picked up all of Gerda's items and browsed through the aisles leisurely, dropping snacks and DVD's into her basket. A few employees watched her curiously when she passed them debating whether or not it truly _was_ Anna Stone in the frozen aisle. The majority must have thought it ludicrous and continued on with their shopping unperturbed.

When Anna finally sidled up to the register the young spotted teenager did a double take. His jaw fell and his nostrils flared in sudden panic. Anna was mildly worried he might faint across the conveyor belt and crush her tomatoes.

"Y-you're –"

Anna interjected quickly. For the sake of the tomatoes. "Yes, it's me. Hi. Could you not make a scene please? I'll sign whatever body part it is you need me to sign."

The teenager nodded ferociously and began to scan her items at a tremendous rate. Anna had a hard time keeping up with him as she bagged her groceries in several plastic bags, hiding her face from other stray shoppers who were looking over their way with interest. The young cashier looked manic and was attracting some unwanted attention from both shoppers and his manager.

"That'll be 82.75," he breathed in awe. When Anna handed him the money his hands shook terribly.

"Do you have a pen?"

He blinked. "Sorry?"

Anna narrowed her eyes to read his name badge. _George_.

"George," she tried, and winced when he squeaked. "George," she said again, on the verge of irritation "Do you have a pen so that I can give you an autograph for being so kind and so … _inconspicuous_."

He produced one from under the counter – along with a post-it. She signed and dedicated it to the best cashier she'd ever had and handed it back to him, ignoring the tears in his eyes. She bid him goodbye and power walked out of the store with her shopping bags in hand.

She took the long way home. The path was dirty with cigarette butts, chewing gum and broken glass. But the sun was shining through the gaps in the trees and the air was fresh and crisp. Anna let her mind wander.

The sound of children playing gave her pause. She stopped and saw with some measure of surprise that she now found herself at the gates of her old primary school

Through the gaps between the iron-wrought entrance Anna was able to see children in blue uniforms playing in the school yard. There were new play sets, swings and an obstacle course. Little girls were swarming atop the structures like ants. A little blonde girl was trying to pull her much shorter red haired friend up, both giggling madly.

Anna smiled a little sadly as she adjusted the strap of her shopping bag over her shoulder.

"Anna?"

The call made her start and spin, turning to face a face which she hadn't seen in well over two years.

"Merida Dunbroch," Anna chuckled.

Merida grinned from beneath her mass of curls and vaulted into Anna's rather full arms. When they separated the two girls grinned stupidly at each other. Merida stuffed her hands in the pockets of her jeans and Anna thought to herself that it looked like she hadn't aged a day over eighteen.

They'd been strange friends. Smoking behind school buildings, under-age drinking in Merida's room on Friday nights, making out on couches at house parties for little else than something to do. They'd met thanks to Mr. Cassidy when he'd taken Anna to a gig. Merida had been on drums. Hair flying, toned arms flailing, eyes alight with a fire - a freedom.

"What are you doing back?" Merida asked in her high thrilling Scottish accent. "Last I heard you were cruisin' through France."

"I was," Anna said, "Got back a few days ago. What are _you_ doing home?"

"Didn't you hear? I'm a session musician now. Working in a small studio in the city."

The smile slipped off Anna's face. No, she hadn't heard. To be honest, she hadn't really kept up with any of her old friends, bar Kristoff who'd staunchly refused to let himself be forgotten.

All she knew was that this time last year Merida had been excavating in El Salvador.

"That's brilliant," she heard herself say. "Bit of a change of pace from digging for pottery."

Merida smirked, nodding. The motion made her mop of hair fall over her eyes which she pushed back with a hand. "A bit, yeah. But here girl, we've got to meet up sometime. I haven't seen you since ..." Merida went very pale, remembering herself. "... in a while."

Anna smiled painfully, aware of Merida's near slip. "It's okay," she said, pitying the look of mortification splattered across her friend's face. "Honestly, it's fine."

"I'm sorry, Anna." Merida shuffled her feet awkwardly. "I don't know what to say. Maybe "Do you want a smoke?"."

Anna laughed despite herself. "I think I wouldn't mind a cigarette."

They lit up like old times - shoulder to shoulder, leaning against the wall of the school with Anna's shopping bags at their feet. They talked about Gerda and Paddy, about Merida's three brothers and the small studio. Anna found that Merida had learned how to blow rings of smoke.

"You should come by the studio," Merida told her with a genuine smile. "We can record a few rough tracks and mess around on all their expensive equipment."

"I'm taking a small break from music," Anna replied. She flicked some ash from the end of her cigarette and watched the flakes catch in the wind. "I just need to ... to rest right now."

Merida rolled her shoulders back. "I can understand that. You been to the grave yet?"

The subject change was so sudden that Anna felt like she'd been slapped. She took a deep lungful of ash and tar and blew it out again, shaking her head. When she spoke her voice was thick and low. "Not yet. Tonight."

They said very little else after that.

* * *

><p>When she arrived home she concentrated on putting away the groceries. The house was empty. Paddy had taken leave to visit an ailing friend that morning. Gerda had taken Anna's departure as time to go into town for some deserved retail therapy. Or so the note on the fridge proclaimed. She smiled at Gerda's swirly 's' and carefully penned; "love you!"<p>

By the time she heard her father's boots clunk into the living room Anna had divested herself of her smoke-smelling clothes and migrated to the couch where she'd become quite engrossed in cat videos on her laptop.

"Clover," he greeted mildly, scratching at the stubble on his chin, "How was your day?"

"Fine," she intoned absently, chuckling when a fat ginger cat tried to wriggle out of a pet door.

Paddy leaned over the back of the couch (and consequently her shoulder) watching the screen for a moment. He didn't understand the level of importance kids these days gave all this technology. It just looked like they were wasting vast amounts of time on Tumblers and BookFaces – Anna laughed as a cat hits a screen door – and videos of other people's pets.

Paddy sniffed in distaste and clamped a hand over his daughter's shoulder. "Help me start dinner, will you?"

She groaned but did as bid, joining him at the counter.

They worked in silence for the most part; each Stone lost in thought. It felt a little bit like the weeks in the aftermath of Brenda's passing. Quiet Paddy had taken on the philosophy of a mollusc then, and completely retreated while his daughter pin wheeled uselessly. She'd lashed out at him in the early days (before the music) and slept on park benches and church pews.

The worst thing was that he'd left her. He'd left her sleep-rough and wander aimlessly through the city. Entirely too preoccupied with his own grief, Paddy hadn't even spared her a thought.

It was the only time Anna had felt acutely adopted.

"How was the tour?"

Anna snapped out of her reverie and glanced quickly at her father chopping carrots.

"Grand," she replied, continuing to peel potatoes. "Sure you should know. I kept sending you all those pictures."

Paddy made a noise in the back of his throat. "Still," he said, lips curling, "Sometimes it's hard to know. We kept seeing all those tabloid stories—"

"I'm gonna stop you right there, Dad. You know half of that stuff is made up, right?"

Paddy sighed. "Some of it looks very incriminating, sweetheart."

Anna laughed uneasily, "Kind of the point of tabloids."

Her father shrugged his shoulders in defeat and set the carrots to boil. Anna cringed at his silence and concentrated on her potatoes. Paddy's silence was something which she still feared, even now. It was like an immovable force. Unless he decided to speak of his own volition there was really very little you could say to inspire a response.

This silence prevailed for a good twenty minutes – all the way to wash-up in fact – before Paddy said, "You're okay, aren't you?"

She wiped her hands dry with a dishcloth and cocked her head to the side, contemplating. "Yeah. Maybe? I don't know. I'm not as bad as I was. I think that's good enough for now."

"For now." Paddy's eyes were soft and understanding.

They shared a smile that translated a shared experience that had torn them apart before flinging them back together again.

* * *

><p>The next morning she found herself in a ratty Dublin county jersey glowering at Kristoff.<p>

A GAA pitch was not necessarily a venue which Anna would have chosen to meet-up with her oldest friend. Never mind that he expected her to puck the sliothar around while they caught up. It was tough to keep up with his hits. Kristoff was a Senior Hurler for a reason. And there was a reason why Anna had sat on the bench for the majority of her short Camogie playing life. Occasionally the sliothar would soar over her head or ducked under her legs and Anna was forced to run after it, looking murderous.

A pair of six year old boys on the opposite field appeared to be snickering at her as she missed another shot. The urge to tell them to fuck off was strong.

Not only were they playing hurling, but Kristoff decided in all his infinite wisdom, that they should _talk_ about hurling too. Which was not something Anna was overly fond of either. She didn't understand match strategies or the tactical decisions of hitting the ball into the wings rather than the forward line. If you asked Anna to name four Dublin players … well, apart from Kristoff she'd come up short alarmingly quickly.

But Kristoff was excited and Anna just enjoyed being outside and out of the house so she allowed him to ramble.

"Ah come on, you have to be there!"

_There_ being the Leinster Semi-final next Saturday. He'd been trying for over half an hour to get her to agree to go.

Anna hit the ball and mentally cheered when it found the boss of Kristoff's hurley. "You know GAA has never really been my thing."

Kristoff sent her a look and passed the sliothar back. Anna sidestepped just in time.

"You were in the same club as us," he reproached, hands at his hips now. "Since your were _five_, Anna."

Not of her own choosing, Anna wanted to blurt. It'd been Paddy's idea. He'd spewed something about building up her character and getting her active. What they had discovered instead was that Anna had incredibly poor hand eye coordination and even less desire to develop said hand eye coordination.

"And I was awful," Anna heard herself say. "I sat on the subs bench for, like, the entirety of my teenage years."

She stopped as the next thought entered her head. It made her mind fuzzy and she had to swallow the sudden lump in her throat to force the words out; "You and your … sister … were always the stars."

She saw his face fall at the admission. It had ripped out of her like knives scraping along her throat. Anna knew that Kristoff realized how tough it had been for her to even _mention_ his sister.

"Just think about it, alright?"

She volleyed the sliothar over. "Alright, alright."

They continued to toss the sliothar between them in silence. The sound of traffic and the occasional magpie and crow were the only intrusions into that silence. Anna concentrated on that and the feel of the hurley in her palms – the vibrations in the wood as she hit the ball and received it. Her heart rate slowed, her breathing deepened.

Well, maybe she _did_ understand the appeal of hurling after all.

Everything in her mind was blissfully vacant. It was condensed into just this – the repeated hit and catch, the smell of the grass under her feet – the sound of children and birds and traffic and wind against her ears – the taste of varnished wood on the tip of her tongue.

So relaxed was she that the thing she uttered next didn't startle her as much as it should have. It was almost like her mind had stripped itself of all defences and allowed Anna to finally vocalize what she had always wanted to say– but hadn't had the strength and courage to.

"How's your sister?"

If it took Kristoff by surprise, he didn't show it. He only fumbled slightly with the sliothar before they regained their rhythm. Hit and catch- hit and catch- hit and catch.

"She's … good," he hedged cautiously, looking at the ball instead of Anna's face. "Still working at the university. Likes it well enough from what she's told me." Hit and catch – hit and catch –hit and catch. "She moved in with Hans about a month ago."

Hit and … miss.

The ball soared over Anna's left shoulder and thudded, largely forgotten, against the grass.

"_... what_?" she said, dangerously low.

Kristoff leaned awkwardly against his hurley, eyes trained to his mud splattered and grass stained shoes. The sight made Anna strangely livid. Why couldn't he look her in the eye?

"That half Norwegian fuck from private school?" she ground out through clenched teeth. "You've got to be kidding me, Kris."

Kristoff shrugged, helpless. "Well, yeah. He kind of snagged her when she was vulnerable and well … she never shook him off."

Anna saw red.

She remembered Hans distinctly. He was from a very affluent family. As the last of a brood of twelve (he'd been a very unplanned addition to the family) Hans had cultivated a veritable _need_ for attention. Every single action he took highlighted this ambition. Yet he was not unloved. His mother had fawned over him and his father groomed him appropriately for greatness. And just as his twelve older brothers before him had, Hans attended an inner-city private school and came upon Kristoff's sister entirely by accident. Something about being a friend of a friend and colliding bodily during an outing. Since that day Hans had followed her and her friends around like a hapless puppy dog.

"Look," Kristoff sighed gravely, looking at Anna earnestly even though she kept avoiding his eye. "She's miserable, Anna. Absolutely heartbroken. She never got over you."

Anna sniffed and said nothing at all. She turned on her heel and trudged the few paces to the forgotten sliothar, rolling it up on the boss of her hurley and into her palm once more.

Kristoff slithered behind her, looking equal parts concerned and guilty.

"Time to head home I think," she said quietly without looking at him.

The bus home rattled over every bump in the road and Kristoff, at her side, kept fidgeting and wringing his hands anxiously in his lap – trying to catch her gaze. Thoughts of Hans swirled through Anna's mind like debris in the midst of a hurricane. Occasionally a memory of Hans from their youth would surface and Anna would fist the inside of her pockets, close her eyes, and take deep breaths to keep her cool.

Of course the creep would have jumped at the chance to -

"Hi."

Anna's eyes popped open at the squeak.

A little boy with dark curly hair and dimples looked up at her and grinned. He had a Thomas the Tank Engine coat and red wellington boots on. Anna blinked and his dimples deepened.

_A small bump under her palms ... marble stone against her fingertips._

Anna felt lightning strike and went numb, gazing at him like death had settled into an empty seat and asked her the time.

The little boy jammed a few fingers into his mouth and smiled around them before his mother called him back to his buggy. Embarrassed and aware of the mother's strange look, Anna averted her eyes at last. Still, she couldn't shake off the feeling of pure pain and dread that settled happily over her soul.

The wound was fresher than the rest of the lacerations she'd suffered in her life. It still bled habitually. The pain was like a white noise to her existence; forever present. Anna's head fogged with memories of rounded abdomens and scans before the bus rattled to a stop and Kristoff nudged her to get up.

The walk home was executed in silence. That is, until something vaguely wedding themed in a shop window caught Kristoff's eye and he began to yap excitedly about wedding preparations. Anna made all the appropriate sounds and nods. In reality, her mind was a thousand miles away.

Images of Kristoff's sister and Hans and even that little boy on the bus collided in one swirling mass of shame, guilt and anger. Anna found it hard to breathe around the ache it inspired in her chest.

Reaching the gate of Anna's house at last, the two friends stopped and regarded each other awkwardly for a moment. Kristoff's hands migrated to the pockets of his jeans and he shrugged his large shoulders, head bowed.

"Look … I know we haven't been getting on really well recently."

Anna felt a sharp pang of shame.

"Kris—"

Kristoff stopped her. "No, don't say anything. It's true. And I also know why. And I'm really sorry, Anna. I really am."

Anna looked over his shoulder out on the road and bit her lip.

"But I do know this is the time for us to move on from that. So I'd like to ask you to be my best-woman."

Anna laughed. She walked towards him and Kristoff's arms wrapped reflexively around her light frame, crushing her to his chest. In that moment the gesture was a relief to them both.

"I think I can manage that," she said, pulling away to tweak his nose.

Kristoff ruffled her hair and took off. He glanced at her over his shoulder with that wide beaming smile that had endeared Anna to him all those years ago. She stood at the gate watching him until he turned a corner out of sight.

Taking in a trembling breath, Anna entered the house and trudged upstairs before sitting heavily on the edge of the bed in her room. She rubbed at her eyes tiredly thinking about Hans and Kristoff and his sister before a glint caught her eye in her peripheral vision. She crawled towards the object – on the bedside table – and found it to be an old GAA medal. She picked it up and turned it over, smiling wryly to herself. Her one and only GAA medal …

Inspired, she opened the top drawer of the bedside table and began to rummage and dig for more forgotten treasures. She found old school copies, coins, old bus tickets and finally a notebook.

She swallowed thickly at the sight of the leather cover.

She took it gingerly and opened it with gentle care, almost reverently, thumbing through the pages. Littered across them were lyrics and songs that had never made the cut. That had never had their time in the sun. When Anna made it to the last entry she froze as she read the title.

Tenerife Sea.

Anna let the notebook fall to the bed covers as she stared blankly at the opposite wall.

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><p><strong>AN: There you have it.**

**Sliothar: ball used in hurling/camogie.**

**Hurling: Fastest field game in the world. National sport of Ireland. **

**Camogie: Female version of hurling. A little like softball is to baseball.**

**Hurley: The stick used in hurling/camogie.**

**Senior Hurler: The top of all hurling players; generally plays with a county team.**

**GAA: Gaelic Athletic Association. **

Review Responses:

Phoebex13: We'll have to wait and see about that. Smoking is bad kids, don't do it. I know right? What a cool course. I have no idea if it even exists but Merida would probably find a way. Losing sleep 5ever.

anon: Thank you for your honesty. To each his own I suppose.

iwantaparrot1: I liked these flashbacks especially because I slipped in a very subtle but major plot point (and no it's not the drinking). The flashbacks are never long, they're supposed to mirror when you yourself have a flash of memory.

Morphimal: That's a compliment in itself I believe. I think you'll be mollified by this chapter though. It will probably tear your heart to shreds but not in the way you were expecting ...

Guest: The plot thickens ... Although after this chapter I think everyone now realizes that Elsa is alive. It's definitely going to break your hearts, though.

theshameonme: Never! The flashbacks were meant to be short - all to gear you up for chapter 5.

xXAndromacheXx: That's a good thing, right? :P

ThatPatheticFanficReader: I know that Anna's thoughts are very repetitive and cyclic but that's done for a reason. She's depressed. Incredibly so. Numb, almost. She's stuck in this vacuum where she repeats memories and thoughts and can't possibly let go of the past. And if your words of inspiration don't reach Anna they mostly will me. Thank you!

Lauren H 91: Yes, that's exactly it. Thank you! 


	6. From Eden - Hozier

Disclaimer: I don't own Frozen.

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><p>6. From Eden, Hozier<p>

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><p>Merida whistled an impressed note as they let the rough cut of the new track fizzle to an end on the speakers of the small studio. Anna, sitting across from her on the red felt couch against the back wall of the tech box, had her arms crossed defensively over her chest and her chin tucked low towards her sternum. She hadn't moved a single muscle since they'd finished recording. Nor glanced Merida's way to gage her reaction.<p>

"This is fucking ace, Anna."

Anna didn't reply.

Merida made a gesture to Stephen the star struck sound engineer to play it again and Anna's unique sound filled the room once more. She tapped her feet in time with the beat, curls bouncing with the motion, eyes closed as she completely immersed herself in the music.

"I don't think we need to add anything to this," she said after a moment, head inclined towards Stephen as though awaiting his judgement.

He shook his head in acceptance. "No, I think it'll take away from the song if we do."

Anna listened to them delegate absently. It had taken a week for Merida to book her into the studio and in that time Anna had poured over the leather journal unearthing lyrics and half-finished songs from a time in her life that she'd tried desperately to bury and forget. It was odd to hear them out into the world when they'd only previously resided in the deepest darkest parts of her head. And to have other people evaluating them was just ... wrong.

"It needs something," she said at last, growing tired of the two softly bickering as guitar strings resonated in the room to the beat of the headache in her temple. "Merida."

The girl mentioned stopped dead and turned soft brown eyes on adverted blue ones. Merida's face was ashen as she took in her childhood friend's demeanour. The lines of Anna's body were hard and angular – her jaw looked more defined and her eyes were dim. When she moved it was in swift strokes like she was in a perpetual hurry. When she sat, as she was now, Anna did so like a Greek statue; hard and unmovable, melancholic even.

"Anna?" she breathed back cautiously.

"A GigPig. Keep it simple. Maybe a little piano."

Merida's brows rose in contemplation. She locked eyes with Stephen who nodded energetically, enamoured with the idea. "Brilliant!" he crowed, "We've got one in the back –" He slid out of his seat and with two quick strides was out of the room.

Stephen's absence left a strange air in the room. Merida shifted uncomfortably in her seat at the soundboard, eyeing Anna in a vigilant way. The other girl for her part was taking no notice of the tense atmosphere. Her head was now craned to the ceiling, leaning it against the back of the couch with her eyes closed. The only signal that she was still amongst the living was the rise and fall of her chest.

And still … why did it look like she was struggling to breathe?

"Anna …" Merida tried, sounding pained to her own ears. "Anna I hate seeing you like this."

"Hmm."

"Come on, will you at least tell me why we're suddenly recording a bunch of songs out of the blue like this? You just released an album six months ago … don't you need some downtime?"

Anna's entire body shifted. It was akin to seeing a dog flatten its ears and lower its body in preparation for the spring of attack. It transformed – she curled forward, leaning her elbows on her knees – and watched Merida in a very frightening predatory way. Her eyes were so dark and lifeless that Merida was transported to beer bottles and Anna bent over the railing of a bridge ready to leap in days after The Night.

The drummer swallowed thickly.

"Work," Anna mumbled after a moment, shoulders dropping before Merida's very eyes (her entire essence seemed to deflate the longer Merida watched her), she ran two calloused hands over her face and grunted. "Work is keeping me sane right now, Mer. Probably the only thing keeping me going."

"The songs aren't new are they?" Merida mumbled, hugging herself. "You wrote them … last year?"

Anna made a soft sound of confirmation that sounded like a rattling sigh.

"I found this old notebook that I used to jot things down in. Love songs mostly … and then yeah, stuff from last year too. So it was kind of like rushing headlong into a wall. Seeing it all there in my own handwriting. I can't really pretend it didn't happen can I? I mean, it's there in black and white."

"And now in song."

Anna chuckled darkly. "And now in song. Why not? Might as well make money off it."

Only it's not for money that you're doing this, Merida thought.

But she didn't say that. They weren't friends like that anymore. They had been once. When Anna had offered up her lighter outside a gig and they'd talked about the wonders of Fleetwood Mac for an hour. When Anna had leaned in, several months later, and kissed her under a dirty street light. When she'd cried right after, pulling away with the name of another girl on her lips and Merida had let her fold into her seventeen year old arms.

No, they weren't friends like that anymore.

Anna looked at her and gave her than funny little quirky smile that had endeared Merida to her that wet and awful night in the smoker's shelter, wet fingers gripped around a green lighter.

Maybe they could be more.

* * *

><p>Days later Anna was sitting before a much larger congregation than St. Vincent's was used to. The little church was bursting at the seams with people. News had spread like wildfire and crowds from all across the city had made the pilgrimage to watch Anna Stone, returned to her small neighbourhood, sing. Some were standing along the walls obscuring Christ's first fall and his mother weeping. Others were pressing in close at the doors, craning their heads to try and catch a glimpse of the singer.<p>

Fr. O'Farell introduced her readily to the new throng, delighting in the claps of delight from his flock as Anna forced a smile on her face as she finished tuning her guitar. His gnarled hands were worrying over the pulpit in excited agitation – his eyes were roaming across the sea of Christians and Jews and Muslims that had made the trip to watch his choir girl.

For one moment – a speck in time – his church had become a Jerusalem.

And yet Anna felt like such an imposter as the sunlight shone in through the stained glass windows and hit the neck of the guitar. It splintered from there. Red and gold caught her cheek. Marked her – seared through her flesh.

The choir girl fragmented with jagged pieces of the guitarist without a Hallelujah to her name.

Gerda smiled at her from the front row and her father nodded.

She began to strum gently. The sound rose to the corbelled ceiling – up to angels (not the ones that mattered) and curled into the crevices of Our Lady's Statue and the large granite crucifix which hung over the altar.

_"If God had a name, what would it be_

_And would you call it to His face_

_If you were faced with Him in all His glory_

_What would you ask if you had just one question_

_Yeah, yeah, God is great_

_Yeah, yeah, God is good_

_Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah_

She was such a hypocrite. If God had a name Anna would spit it out with the vomit inspired from vodka and regret, she'd carve it on stones and skip them into the river Liffey to sink, she'd take it in vain and hit him where it hurt. Like where he hit Anna where it hurt the most – pulled his arm back – and let the arrow fly.

_What if God was one of us_

_Just a slob like one of us_

_Just a stranger on the bus_

_Trying to make His way home"_

Anna finished the song, feeling numb. The sun had moved to another corner of the church lightening faces and suddenly – she wasn't sure … she thought she'd seen a flash of a familiar blonde head disappearing out the doors.

People clapped and she dismissed the idea, smiling her practiced smile into the congregation and up at a preening Fr. O'Farell. She put it down to an illusion created because of the lack of sleep these past few days with the studio work and the notebook. She and Merida had spent countless restless nightfall's annotating music to words her teenage hand had scribbled into the pages.

Anna slipped down to the pews next to her aunt and Paddy as Fr. O'Farell continued with his sermon. She let her chin drop on her chest and let the weight of a hundred eyes lull her far away from here and most importantly, from the all-seeing gaze of a bearded man painted in the centre of the corbelled roof over her head.

After, Anna and her family found themselves swarmed on the steps outside the church. Photographers and news crews who'd respectfully waited to ambush her were calling out to Anna for a photograph or statement. Fans pressed in with Mass cards and pens.

Anna held her guitar case out in front of her like a shield as she answered a reporter's questions, watching Paddy from the corner of her eye push a woman with a clunky camera back with his forearm.

Blonde.

The snatch of gold was so sudden that Anna's breath hitched and the man with the microphone wondering why she'd gone into hiding after the tour, muted. Across the street – next to a lamppost with her arms crossed watching the commotion …

It couldn't be …

But it was. It was _her_.

The piercing ringing in Anna's ears was _almost_ soothing the panic. The edge of her vision blurred but _she_ came into hyper focus. From her black pea coat, to the black gloves on her hands grasping her forearms in a vice grip, to the tortured blue of her eyes and the tendrils of blonde hair spilling from her ponytail.

Their eyes locked and Anna felt a chained animal in her chest howl.

It was Elsa.

And she still looked as beautiful as the day Anna had kissed on her on the stoop of their home for the last time and returned to an empty closet. The memory of it felt like a scalpel to her internal organs – dissecting her heart to marvel at its functionality. It was still beating? The surgeon would marvel. But how on earth was it still beating?

Elsa – _fuck_, the name … she hadn't said the name to herself in close to a year. Elsa waved with a small tearful smile and Anna's body went very still. She was almost sure the very blood in her veins stopped flowing.

Paddy, God bless him, put an end to the interview and nudged the space between her shoulder blades. It jarred her back just enough for Gerda to take her case from her trembling hands. They'd noticed her too. Paddy was staring at the woman on the other side of the street with a blank stare. Gerda had a hand over her mouth like she was trying to hold in a laugh or a sob.

Paddy looked at her and Anna understood what he was saying without having to ask. She tried to take a step forward but Elsa startled like a trapped animal and turned to flee down the road.

_Fuck no – not again!_

Anna took off at a sprint across the road and the sharp honk and the screech of tires made her fall back and land hard on her ass. People screamed and cameras flashed. The driver fell out of the car with a wild panicked shout of "What the fuck do you think you're doing?!" as Gerda ran to her side and knelt down to help Anna up.

Anna groaned but searched for Elsa in the distance. Elsa had stopped dead at the end of the road as Anna got to her shaky feet, leaning on Gerda's forearm while Paddy and the driver roared at each other. Seeing that she was alright Elsa turned a corner out of sight.

Anna wanted to shout. Wanted to scream and cry and bury the hole in her body with something bigger than this sadness. She clenched her fists together and winced at the sting. She raised them shakily and saw that she'd gotten scrapes from where her hands had collided with the road.

It was possibly the smallest pain Elsa had ever inflicted on her.

"Anna, you should have been more careful! Crossing the road like that!" Gerda muttered somewhat harshly. Her voice was thick with fear, still, as she led Anna back through the crowd towards the church to be tended to.

Anna realized as people parted like the red sea that she still loved her. Would always love her, maybe.

"Sweetheart, you both need to talk to each other. This isn't healthy."

The Leinster final. Kristoff and his team had qualified through to the final … Elsa would be there to see him play.

It was good as a place as any to talk about everything.

* * *

><p>Anna shoved a jersey over her head and checked her reflection in the mirror. She'd braided her hair in twin braids and Aunt Gerda had painted a Dublin flag on her cheek. The black and blue stood out on her pale face like twin bruises. It was there – stamped for all to see. She was a Dubliner. Yet she still felt like she was masquerading– like a tourist trying to fit in. How long had it been since she'd felt like she truly belonged here?<p>

Anna slipped her phone and ticket in her pocket, grabbed her keys and thundered down the stairs trying hard not to think about it. Gerda and Paddy had left earlier that afternoon to their local pub to watch the match on the big screen TV with their friends so the house was empty and dark. Anna shouldered her jacket in the gloom.

She locked the door behind her and waved the taxi on the kerb to wait a moment. When she slid into the passenger seat the driver gasped.

"You're Anna Stone!" he cackled. "Jaysus wait till the lads hear about this! My kid has all your albums – even the old stuff!"

Anna smiled awkwardly. "Thanks. Croke Park, yeah?"

He pushed button on the sound system and her voice flooded the car. Anna tried very hard not to smash the thing to pieces. Her driver – a balding man with a thick moustache, ironically – babbled incessantly about the various concerts he'd attended in his life and whether Anna had ever met the acts he'd paid to see as they drove.

Anna let him talk. White noise was a comfort. Her thoughts were whirring through the possible scenarios of how Elsa would take her sudden apparition. Kristoff had given her a ticket last night –

"Your seat is next to Elsa's." His eyes had been heavy and his lips curled back in faint worry, as though he wasn't sure whether or not he had made the right decision. "She doesn't know you're showing up."

And that was that.

When they'd reached their destination Anna slipped the driver a fifty and signed the back of her own CD case before joining the masses in their pilgrimage to Croke Park. She presented her ticket at the gates and thankfully, with the braids and the palpable excitement in the air, no one noticed her. Paid her even the slightest attention actually. Children with flags and horns scampered ahead of their parents and old ladies with wrapped sandwiches gossiped by overflowing bins.

When Anna found her seat, after getting lost a handful of times, she was surprised to find that Kristoff had hooked her up with a balcony spot under the awning. She shot him a thank you text and received a reply before her ass had even touched the seat.

_Stop texting me dickhead im trying to pump up_

Then almost immediately after that;

_Thanks for coming it means a lot. And good luck. Elsa told me she just arrived too_

Anna swallowed thickly at the thought of Elsa being close. She wasn't sure if she was ready to see the woman. Part of her revelled in the idea though.

They used to come to these things all the time growing up. Elsa had been great football player and a massive GAA fan. Uncoordinated Anna had been volunteered along to trips to Croke Park since before she could remember. She recalled Elsa getting deliciously frustrated during matches. The girl used to hurl insults at the referee and have a running commentary while Anna tried not to make eye-contact with the disgruntled people they were sat next to.

She wondered if Elsa still did that.

She was contemplating that very fact when suddenly someone dropped into the seat next to hers. She glanced at this new apparition before a small squeak left her lips and her heart hammered tight against her rib cage.

_This is happening._

It was Elsa decked out in her own faded Dublin shirt (Anna had given it to her on her sixteenth birthday) with her hair plaited in one long braid over her shoulder. She whispered a soft 'hi', eyes watery and so blue and all Anna could do was stare at her.

Elsa hadn't changed a bit. She was still heartbreakingly beautiful. And Anna's heart was shattered into a million pieces as they gazed at each other.

She opened up a bag Anna never noticed on her lap and handed her a packet of Tayto crisps with a funny familiar smile that made Anna's breath hitch.

Tayto crisps were her favourite.

Anna took it from her, careful not to let their hands brush, and whispered a soft thank you.

"Kristoff?" Elsa guessed.

Anna nodded.

"How was the tour?" Elsa asked suddenly, as a family of four settled in front of them. Anna concentrated on the mother handing out biscuits and napkins instead of the catch in Elsa's voice.

"Good. I kept busy."

Elsa shuffled her limbs uncertainly next to her. "I'm glad. How's your dad?"

"Fat."

The remark caused quite an un-lady like snort to erupt from her neighbour. Anna whipped her head in the direction it had come from and she gawked at the glee splashed across Elsa's face and the way the woman was holding her two hands over her mouth, like she couldn't believe what she had just done.

The tension broke. Anna smiled tentatively at Elsa who smiled back tearily, lowering her hands to her jean clad knees.

"Your aunt's fattening him up?"

Anna chuckled. "You could say that. I've seen him sneaking biscuits from the tin when he thinks no one's looking."

"Like daughter like father," Elsa teased gently, watching Anna intently to gage her reaction.

Anna leaned back in her seat and crossed her arms, staring out at the pitch. Her throat bobbed as she travelled back in time to her own kitchen, Elsa at the kettle pouring hot water into two mugs, and trying to sneak an extra jaffa cake from Elsa's plate.

She forced herself to smile and nodded. "Yeah," she said, glancing at Elsa worrying her bottom lip between her teeth. "So how are you?"

Elsa paused and linked her hands over her stomach. The action wasn't lost on Anna who felt the world slip under her feet.

"Good," Elsa murmured, "Work is going well. I'm conducting really interesting research on the link between health and socioeconomic status for my Masters."

Elsa Arendelle everybody. Trinity College Psychology graduate.

The teams came out of their respective dressing rooms before Anna could respond with something clever or intelligent. When the match started and Kristoff had the sliothar in hand, Anna discovered that Elsa still got worked up over the referee and still dabbled in a running commentary. She jumped up when Kristoff scored and chanted with the rest of the crowd when the moment called for such a display of vocal prowess.

Anna watched her, smitten and lovesick.

When it was half-time they didn't know what to say to each other despite the fact that Anna had spent most of the first half trying to think of what to say to Elsa. She rubbed her greasy hands on her jeans and cleared her throat. Elsa beat her to it.

"I'm so sorry for almost getting you knocked down last weekend –" She said it fast, like pulling a bandaid. "I … I just wanted to see you, I guess. And after everything that happened … between us and after the baby –"

Anna winced and fisted her hands in her lap.

Elsa paused at Anna's reaction and let out a shaky sigh. "You've been to see him. There were fresh flowers on his grave."

Anna closed her eyes tightly. The soft buzz of the crowd and the colliding chants (For Dublin, for Galway) thankfully obscured the thoughts of baby bumps from her mind.

"I went down before the concert the first night I got into Dublin," she managed to ground out through clenched teeth. "It's nice. The teddy bears are … nice."

Elsa sniffled. "Kristoff wanted to make a little hurley for his anniversary." She giggled wetly, rubbing at her eyes with the palm of her hand.

Anna pretended to groan but laughed through the sharp pain under her breastbone. "Another Arendelle GAA star," she said softly, looking into Elsa's spilling eyes. Her own were misting in sympathy and pain for their shared loss.

Elsa sent her a look and when Anna asked what was wrong she just shook her head and turned her attention back to the field. The game picked up soon after and they didn't speak again.

After, when Dublin were celebrating their win and speeches were being shouted across the stadium, Elsa leaned into her side (Anna's body thrummed) and asked her if she wanted to grab a late lunch since Kristoff was going out to celebrate with the team. Anna wanted to say yes but all she could think about was getting that text message that said '_I'm sorry. I miscarried. I'm going home to my parents. It's over. I'm sorry'_ and the empty cupboards, and the ring on the bedside table.

Thirty five unreturned calls, a breakdown and galleons of alcohol and nicotine later here they were. Maybe the very least they owed each other was a meal.

So they left the stadium long before the crowds, and walked the half mile to Elsa's car in silence. Anna slipped into the passenger side and leaned her head against the glass watching the city blur and streak past her window. Elsa didn't turn the radio on.

Then they drove out to Clontarf – a small seaside suburb with café's and shops overlooking a strand. There was a lighthouse in the distance. Elsa parked the car and invited Anna to step out with a nod to a small bistro in the distance.

Once inside, conversation came more easily. Maybe it was the neutral territory or the seaside air. Maybe it was maturity rearing his level-headed head and deciding that Anna and Elsa had too much history to throw away. So they spent the afternoon talking about Anna's music and Elsa's research and Kristoff's wedding. It was easy – comfortable. They tiptoed around the miscarriage and Elsa's flight from home. Their eyes caught once in a while and flashes of the past would translate but they swallowed the explanations and questions down again.

After when Anna walked Elsa to her car, she was startled to find her box of cigarette's in the pocket of her coat. She hadn't suffered a craving once today …

Elsa fiddled with her car keys as Anna puzzled over this and cleared her throat. The musician's head snapped up immediately.

"Thank you for today. It was … wonderful."

Anna blinked hard at Elsa.

She thought back on the day and had to agree. Yes, seeing Elsa hurt. Remembering that their child had died and that Elsa had left twisted a knife in her heart like no other. But if you stripped that away, what she'd felt was an undercurrent of pure contentment and happiness she hadn't experienced since cosy Friday nights curled up on the sofa with a baby bump under her palms and a soft warm body nestled into her, watching crappy X-Factor.

The sun was setting behind Elsa on the strand and it curled around her like a halo. Her cornflower eyes were the prettiest thing she'd ever seen. Anna forgot to breathe for a moment

"Goodbye Anna."

Anna offered her a small smile in return. They owed it to each other.

"Goodbye, Elsa."

* * *

><p>AN: Elsa's back. And I've got the flu so the fact that I finished this is a small miracle.

Review Responses:

Guest: There you have it - the whole ugly truth on display.

Guest: I'm afraid I won't be answering whether it's a happy ending or not. But thanks for your continued support!

kenfromnhus: Thank you! Elsa is a very good singer but prefers to do so in the car or while she's cleaning.

xXAndromacheXx: At least you can't say I'm predictable!

iwantaparrot1: The spoiler is there for sure. Just very subtly embedded. I'm emotionally invested too. Way too much in fact.

theshameonme: Thanks, I like to think I have good taste in Irish artists. I'm glad you like HIMYM-Frozen, too.

Morphimal: Hi Morphimal, I did have a beta reader but unfortunately K's life sort of took over. If you see grammar mistakes most of them will probably be due to the fact that I spell in the European way. And I won't be changing that. Ooooh, that's sneaky.

H: Yes, if you're right in what you think it is than it is a terrible thing to go through. Thank you, I hope you enjoy this chapter too.

ElsaMaureenElphaba: A wild Hans appears! You found him in the tall grass!

ThatPatheticFanficReader: Whoever is Kristoff's sister though! My money's on Sven. Anyone else want to wager with me? And thank you, I appreciate your continued support.

actionpotential: I'm really feeling for Anna too.

Guest: I know what you mean. And here it is!

Caliax: Moody is my default setting. As my mother.

harvingtonii: Ireland for the win. Dublin for lyf. Same, I love me some musical playlist. Totally will bae.

Lauren H 91: Thank you, I'm very glad!

Guest: You were so close, Guest. So close.

Bijnaam: I'm very glad that you're pleased with both my writing and the story. Here's the next chapter!

Phoebex13: The sea in Tenerife Sea is just my tears. It's an Irish sport. Our religion, really.

CupidLove: You're perhaps the only person, bar one another, who likes the flashbacks! Tenerife Sea is life.

SnowflakesFrozenForever: You have no idea how much I completely agree with you. Thanks!

Tamahiko Mikoshiba: Ouch. Ehm ... well, that would be a wonderful outcome but we'll have to wait to find out what happens. Making someone forget how to English is a mighty compliment. Thanks!

notguest: Thank you!

Guest: There's that Elsa/Anna reunion you were looking forward to! I hope you had tissues handy ...


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